


Kittens

by st_aurafina



Series: The Unexpected Skillset of Harold Finch [1]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Gen, Kittens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-18 07:45:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13677321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/st_aurafina/pseuds/st_aurafina
Summary: 1. Caring for orphaned animals





	Kittens

Carter bellied along the stormwater drain and wondered, not for the first time, why she had ever volunteered to work with these maniacs. 

"You're doing very well, Detective," said Harold's voice in her ear. "I appreciate that this is an uncomfortable situation, but the storm front is closing in."

There was mud squelching down her neckline. Carter sighed and kept moving. "Has John pinned down that gunman yet?" She didn't know how Harold got wind of the attack almost before it began, but the fact that she and John were on site at the park when the kid got out his rifle had saved a lot of lives. Now there were just a lot of lost, scared kids to round up before the storm rolled into town. 

There was a slight pause, presumably while Harold had just that same conversation with John on another line. "He has the boy restrained. Any sign of the children? I saw three of them enter the pipe around the time that the panic erupted at the park." 

"Be quiet for a moment, and I'll tell you," Carter said, and stopped moving. She held her breath and listened carefully: dripping water, the scratch of rats or twigs against the concrete pipe, and maybe, distantly, the hushed whispers of frightened voices. "Yeah, Finch, I think I hear something." 

"Excellent." The relief in Harold's voice was palpable. "Well done." 

Carter moved ahead again. It was cold and wet, and it was giving her some serious flashbacks to boot camp training. "You predict all this stuff happening, Finch, how come you don't outfit your people with things like headlamps and scuba gear?" 

Harold laughed on the other end of the line. "I only wish I were able to prophesise so accurately, Detective. How about I promise to cover your cleaning bills? Would that compensate you adequately?" 

"Throw in a hot breakfast and you've got a deal." Carter paused for a moment to consider that small comfort, then pushed on. 

"I think I can see my way towards that." 

Ahead, the river of mud emptied into a large vertical pipe. Carter moved to the edge and spun her legs around, feeling for the access ladder that ought to be there. She climbed down with quick, sure steps, her boots fitting neatly onto each rung. She was thigh-deep in cold water; if those kids were down here, they had to be chest deep, and risking hypothermia. She reached for her flashlight and played it down the wider section of the tunnel.

"Anyone down here? My name's Detective Carter, I'm with the police." 

There was a long pause, punctuated by lapping water and an odd mewing sound. Then a voice, tremulous and determined, called back to her. 

"If you're police, you better have a badge!" It was a young voice, obviously frightened, but determined to do things the right way. 

Carter grinned. "You're damn right I've got a badge," she said, and tapped her earpiece. "I think I've got them, Finch," she said quietly. 

"Oh, thank goodness," said Finch. "I'll send John to help as soon as I can." 

There were three of them, two girls keeping a smaller boy afloat between them, all of them blue with chattering teeth. Carter expected them to be shocky and silent, but once her credentials were cleared by the eldest girl, they piled on her, excited to show her what they had found. 

The boy, balanced on the joined hands of the girls, held in his arms a bundle of wet and scrawny fur: an abandoned litter of five kittens, all curled hard against the waning warmth of the child's skin. 

"We saved them!" said the eldest girl. "If we hadn't run down here to hide, they would have drowned." 

Carter thought about the long haul through the narrow pipe, and about doing it all over again with three children and five half-dead kittens. Then she gazed at the grubby faces of the kids in the dim glow of her flashlight and she smiled. "You did save them. Now, let's get them home and dry and safe, what do you say?" 

To be honest, the return journey was easier for the children than it was for Carter, being smaller and able to crawl properly. She fashioned an improvised sling from the sleeve of her shirt, lashed it to the belly of the smallest child, and stuffed it full of the wet kittens. Once they had negotiated the ladder, the boy could walk bent over in the pipe, and he carefully kept the kittens above the water level all the way to the opening in the park. 

John was waiting there with an umbrella and paramedics. He helped each child out from the pipe with an easy hoist, pausing only for a moment at the third one and his precious load of fur. The paramedic he passed the boy to took one look at the animals and shook his head. 

"Not in my bus," he said. "Sorry, kid." 

John untied the knot of the sling, and passed the bundle to Carter, much to the dismay of the small boy, who, at the end of a long and miserable day, finally burst into tears. 

Carter had never seen John back off so fast, with such a terrified expression. It almost made up for the mud. She held the bundle of squirming kittens under one arm and brushed the hair out of the boy's eyes.

"Now, I'm going to take real good care of these babies for you. You know what your job is?" 

The kid shook his head, and in trying to scrub his tears away rubbed more mud on his face. 

"You're going to go in the ambulance, and see your mom and dad, and get really, really well. Then, when you're better, you can come see how well these guys have done, do you understand? Can you promise me that?" 

The boy nodded, and took the hand of the paramedic. When the scene was safely clear of traumatised children, John reappeared, and helped Carter get to the safe house before the storm rolled in properly. 

A warm shower had never felt this good, she was fairly sure. It took a long while to get all of the mud out of all of the places it had crept, but by the time she was dry and in clean clothes, she emerged from the bathroom, to a wall of heat from the fireplace, and the aromas of paprika and fresh bread. 

From the main room, she heard Harold talking. "No, John, there's nothing to it, really: you just hold the dropper up and the kitten will take care of the rest, I assure you." Harold sat in the armchair by the fire, holding a clean, dry kitten and feeding it from an eyedropper with unexpected calm. Every now and then he paused, tapped something out one-handed on his laptop, then brought the dropper back to the kitten's mouth before it could mew in distress. The kitten kneaded at his fingers with tiny paws, eyes blissfully closed in pleasure.

Beside the fireplace, John held another kitten with considerably less sangfroid, but he was still managing to get milk into it. "I thought you had to use special formula for this," he said. 

Harold refilled his eyedropper from the teacup on the coffee table. "That would be ideal, of course, but milk and egg yolks will do at a pinch. As long as we warm the little things up before we feed them, it will keep them going until we get them to a shelter." 

The other three kittens nestled against Bear's flank, who watched over them with a protective, if confused expression. John's face was somewhat similar.

"Ah, Detective, there's soup and warm rolls in the kitchen," Harold said, placidly. "Or, if you'd prefer –" he gestured towards a cardboard box of eyedroppers. "There are several more hungry mouths to feed." He looked up at her, and frowned at her surprised expression. "Well, it seemed unreasonable to further burden the animal shelters at this time of night, with the storm. They're going to have enough to do as it is." 

"Pull up a pew," said John. "There's plenty of kittens to go around." His kitten sneezed, spattering his lapels with milk, then latched onto the eyedropper again with furious intensity. 

"Nah," said Carter, and headed to the kitchen. "I've done my time bottle feeding a baby. I'll take a break this time around." She filled a mug with soup, and sat down by the fire to watch them tend to their charges, and she felt an odd but comforting camaraderie.


End file.
